A 2025 National Storytelling Festival Preview
Before April Armstrong decided to become a storyteller, she had a different dream: to win the Little Miss America pageant. 
It was a dream that involved a very special dress from her grandmother, patent leather shoes with little white socks (you know the ones), a portfolio of finger paintings to prove her talent, and a very long bus ride with her mother from their home in New York City to some far reach of New Jersey. In the rain.
That was the first time little April had reached for something big, and it ended in bitter disappointment. But the next year, in third grade, she landed the lead in the school play, and a star was (re)born.
The little girl had a new dream: she would be on television. And this time, she would not be disappointed.
Later in life, Armstrong was working as an actress and educator in New York for many years when storytelling found her. She had done serious work on the stage and fun stuff for TV, including a recurring role on “Law & Order.” (She played a reporter, not a suspect or a victim.) Storytelling was a natural fit because it combined Armstrong’s considerable talents as a musician — she had long since moved on from finger painting — with her passion for drama. She honed her craft first as an educator, moving on to adult audiences once she had developed her skills and established a solid repertoire.
Since then, Armstrong has been expanding her story collection for some 20 years. But in Jonesborough, she’ll be a “new voice” at the National Storytelling Festival, the honorable title for performers who are serving as featured tellers for the first time. Her official debut, at the Festival’s Exchange Place in 2023, was short but sweet — a warm and rousing folk tale that left her audience wanting more.
At the Festival this year, Armstrong will perform her signature one-woman show, a zippy biography of aviatrix and daredevil stuntwoman Bessie Coleman, the first Black female pilot in the United States. “She was really an extraordinary person, a very daring person” Armstrong says. “Personally, that couldn’t have been me.”
Armstrong will also bring a wide range of folk tales and personal stories with her to Jonesborough. A lively song or two are almost always in the mix. “Music tends to be an anchor for me,” the storyteller says. Several of her original songs are featured in the Bessie Coleman piece, and singing with drums punctuates her other tales.
She won’t be wearing the patent shoes or the little socks. But if you watch very closely when Armstrong takes the stage at the National Storytelling Festival, a trace of Little Miss America might just be there.
April is the latest featured teller in our New Voice series, a preview of the 52nd Annual National Storytelling Festival. You can read our profiles of Tim Ereneta, Sufian Zhemukhov, and Lipbone Redding on the ISC website. Learn about our other featured storytellers here. Join us for the Festival in Jonesborough October 3-5, 2025.